McKinsey: Rankings Ought to Show Who Is on the Job

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Global university rankings should measure whether graduates are able to get jobs as well as institutions' teaching and research records, according to one of the world's most influential consulting firms.

Mona Mourshed, leader of the education practice at McKinsey and Company, said that the world's universities were producing too many graduates who were likely to be unemployed or underemployed.

"The entire motivation of education provision today is 'We're here to attract you and bring you in, to provide you with a good-quality education', but there is very little focus on what happens to you when you leave campus," she told Times Higher Education at the World Innovation Summit for Education in Qatar.

"So if we are going to be in a world where people pay more attention to that, is it possible to have these things reflected in the rankings? It certainly could be."

Global league tables such as the THE World University Rankings do not use data on graduate employment or earnings when calculating the figures. However, other rankings, such as the Financial Times' Global MBA Rankings, do incorporate graduates' average salaries.

According to a McKinsey report to be released in December, there are "vacancies that are going unfilled because of a lack of skills" in a variety of economies, Dr Mourshed said. Given that workers were now likely to switch jobs frequently over the course of their careers, "what we need are people who are anchored in a discipline and who have a suite of soft skills to support them to rapidly learn as their career progresses". …